Dome Detail

Detail of the dome of Santa Costanza, erected in the 4th century and decorated with 17th- and 18th-century paintings. Originally, the dome was covered in mosaics, whose content is known from 16th- and 17th-century paintings of them: New Testament scenes behind a golden screen of Bacchic imagery beyond the river Styx. A 16th-century antiquarian also reported seeing mosaics of two seated saintly women, which supports the theory that this mausoleum housed the bodies of both Constantia and Helena.